A 4-pound cannon ball was buried in this ancient elm (still standing on property of Mark Oliver at 298 Main Street), during the battle of Springfield. It was removed in recent years.

By the time of the Revolution the settlement of scattered
houses seems to have become united in a struggle
against a common enemy. We do not know how many
left their homes to join the Revolutionary Army, but a
militia was formed, and in 1780 when Washington was
living out his desperate days in Morristown, guards were
posted on every mountain pass, and beacon fires were
ready on every height to shout their warning by smoke
and fire to Washington's forces of any advance by the
enemy. Those fires were lighted and the guards alerted
that day in early June when word was received that the
enemy, 5000 strong, sent by General Sir Henry Clinton,
under the Hessian, General Knyphausen, was approaching from Elizabethtown, General Washington took his
position among the short hills.

The account in the newspapers of the day present
the picture:

Morristown, June 9, 1780
The day before yesterday the enemy turned out from
New York via Staten Island and landed in Elizabethtown about 5,000 men. Our army moved to meet them.
The militia turned out in spirit skirmishing in abundance. One militia captain with 4 men took 16 British
. . . They have been between Connecticut Farms and
Springfield and burned every house in the former (about
20 in number) except one. They have been driven back
to Elizabethtown Point where they lie behind our old
intrenchments. Our army is at the short hills this side
of Springfield. Militia are near the enemy and keep
popping at them. . . .

And another,

Baskingridge, June 10, 1780
General Washington remains with the main body of
our army at the short hills ...

Nicholas Parsil of White Oak Ridge seems to have
been one of the victims of those abundant skirmishes,
for his headstone in his family cemetery at the northeast corner of White Oak Ridge Road and Parsonage

Hill Road gives the date of his death as June 10, 1780,
and his epitaph,

Behold me here as you pass by
Who bled and dyd for liberty
From British tyrants now am free
Prepare my friends to follow me.

certainly indicates that he fell in the cause of the
Colonies.

Those June days must have been filled with anxiety
and fear in the land below the mountain. Connecticut
Farms (Union) was burned to the ground; Mrs. James
Caldwell was murdered by a Hessian soldier; the armies
shuttled back and forth for days between Elizabethtown
and the vicinity of Springfield, skirmishing and "pop-
ping" at each other. Finally, on the morning of June
23rd, it was apparent that this was the fateful day.
Major General Green reported to General Washington
the next day in detail.

Springfield, June 24, 1780
Sir:

I have been too busily employed until the present
moment to lay before your Excellency the transactions
of yesterday.

The enemy advanced from Elizabethtown Point
about 5 in the morning, said to be about 5,000 infantry
with a large body of cavalry and 15 or 20 pieces of
artillery. Their march was rapid and compact. They
moved in two columns, one on the main road leading
to Springfield, the other on the Vauxhall Road. Major
Lee with the horse and piquet opposed the right column
and Colonel Dayton with his regiment the left. Both
gave as much opposition as could have been expected
with so small a force.

... I disposed of our troops in the best manner
I could ...

Colonel Angell was posted to secure the bridge in
front of the town.

Colonel Shrieve's regiment was drawn up at the
second bridge to cover the retreat of those posted at
the first.

Major Lee with his dragoons and piquet com-
manded by Captain Walker was posted at Little's Bridge
on the Vauxhall Road, and Colonel Ogden was detached
to support him ...

Their right column advanced on Major Lee. The
bridge was disputed with great obstinacy, and the enemy
must have received very considerable injury, but by
fording the river and gaining the point on the hill they
obliged the Major with his party to give up the pass.

At this instant their last column began the attack
on Colonel Angell. The action lasted about 40 minutes
when superior numbers overcame obstinate bravery and
forced our troops to retire over the second bridge. There
the enemy were warmly received by Colonel Shrieve's
regiment . . .

As the enemy continued to press on our left on
Vauxhall Road which led directly into our rear ... I
thought it most advisable to take our post upon the first
range of hills in the rear of Byram's Tavern.

.. I lament that our force was too small to save
the town from ruin. I wish every American could have
been a spectator. They would have felt for the sufferers
and joined to revenge the injury.

I have the honor to be, etc.

N. Green, Maj. General.

The statistics which follow the report state that Lee
lost 1 killed, 4 wounded; Shrieve lost 1 killed, 1
wounded, 2 missing, and Dayton lost 2 killed, 7
wounded, and 4 missing.

The Springfield Presbyterian Church. Present Church was built in 1791 to replace one burnt by British in 1780.

Major Lee's stand at the bridge on Vauxhall Road,
just a few hundred feet southeast of Millburn Avenue,
is commemorated by a tablet which reads:

At this site during the battle of Springfield June 23,
1780, the Americans consisting of Continental Dra goons and militia of this and surrounding neighbor-
hoods under Colonel "Light Horse" Harry Lee,
Colonel Matthias Ogden, and Captain George
Walker, encountered the right column of the British
forces which were being led to an attack on General
Greene at Short Hills and maintained the post until
the enemy diverted his course.

A tablet on the bridge over the Rahway River on
Morris Turnpike pays like tribute to Colonel Angell.
On the heights above the town General Washington
watched his little army hold back a vastly superior force
and thereby save his precious stores at Morristown.
Today the cliff is known as "Washington Rock" and a
tablet placed there reads:

Tradition places George Washington here in the
summer of 1780 observing American troops thwart
British efforts to reach Morristown and destroy his
base of supplies. . . .

The British troops who left this area on the night of
June 23, 1780, were the last British forces to appear in
New Jersey.

On the side of the enemy engaged in battle that day
were two Hessian brothers named VanWert. Perhaps
they were sick of war; the country that June day was
beautiful, and they were young and no doubt lonely for
home. Whatever the reason they decided to desert. At
this point the story breaks up into two versions  one,
that they hid that night in the attic of the Reeve house
(now 155 Millburn Avenue); the other, that they sought
refuge in Stephen Meeker's barn at the head of Glen
Avenue near Farley Road, and eventually were given
employment by Mr. Meeker on his farm. Wherever
they hid, they remained until after the British had left
New Jersey. They married here and are believed to be
the progenitors of many of the VanWerts found in this
locahty. The name "Hessian House" has long been
fixed on the Reeve home, however, and popular usage
has a way of giving credence to a legend, so as long as
the building at 155 Millburn Avenue remains, it will, no
doubt, stand as the center of one of the folk tales of
the Revolutionary War in these parts.

As battles go, the battle of Springfield is not numbered among the world's great battles, but in his preface
to "Cockpit of the Revolution" Professor Leonard Lundin says,

It is hardly too much to say that the fate of Morristown was more important for the outcome of the
war than the fortunes of any other town in the
United States except Albany, and that the Watchung
Mountains, of which probably few schoolboys outside New Jersey, have heard, were of greater significance in the contest than was Breed's* Hill.